Just keep on trying till you run out of cake

I've been thinking (never a good thing, I know). One of the things that struck me is just how arbitrary most things about Christmas are. Why do we put up a tree? Why do we eat turkey? Why do we do it on December 25? And so on and so forth.

For some of the traditions, you can look back and see how they started, while others are more obscure, but for pretty much all of them, the reason that we carry on doing them is that that's the way that we've always done them. And that's fine and that's good. It's always nice to have an entirely arbitrary excuse to do things that you enjoy.

It set me thinking, though. What's to stop me from making up my own completely arbitrary holiday with my own completely arbitrary traditions. There are so many possibilities. To name just a few, here are things that everyone could do on my new holiday:

Wear corsetsEat fondueCommunicate only with gesture and never speakDye their hair bright pinkFlirt shamelesslyPlay Monopoly

Now I'm not saying that any of these specific things are good ideas, but they're no more arbitrary than a lot of the traditions and holidays we currently have.

I think I'm going to have to spend some time pondering exactly what form I want my new holiday to take. If I come up with anything half decent, I may attempt to celebrate it next year, and bullycoerce encourage as many other people as I can to do so as well.

What about you guys? What would you put into your own personal arbitrary holidays?

I quite like agnostica as arbitrary celebrations and traditions go. We did a proper agnostica party last year (or was it the year before? I'm going senile...) with mobius chains and a random bag-of-fun and everything.

It may just be the stress of the moment, but I'd subscribe to an 'International Stay Home In Your Slippers And Watch Movies All Day' day. Though I'd also get on the bandwagon of any holiday that demands I dress up in outlandish clothes and scare chocolate out of complete strangers.